This is the best of the tarocchino two handers. For two player games, I don’t normally venture beyond bezique but this is enough fun to attract me to it. Remember that you will need to read The Tarocchino first.

Play is up to 1000 points, if both players can make this at the end of a hand, then the player with the highest score wins. If played for a stake - it is kept fixed.

Players take turns to deal, with first Dealer being chosen at random. Each player receives four packets of 5 cards, with Dealer taking 7 in the last round. If a player can declare sequences or cricce from the cards they hold to make 1000 points, then they make the declarations and claim the game. Otherwise, each player must discard 10 cards that may not include Honours or Kings - each player’s discards count to their tricks at the end.

Two more rounds of 5 cards are dealt with Dealer taking the last two cards and making a further discard of 2 according to the above rules.

Dealer’s opponent leads to the first trick. Players must always follow suit if they can, if not, then they must play a trump, and if they cannot trump, then they may play any card, though it will not win.

The Fool may be played to any trick as an excuse for not playing a card you are otherwise obliged to play, though it beats nothing. At the end of a trick to which the Fool has been played, if the player who played it loses the trick, they take the Fool into their own trick pile and give the opponent an empty card from their trick pile in exchange. However, if the player that played the Fool loses every trick, then they must give the card to the opponent at the end of the hand.

After the hand is played, card points are scored followed by the cricce and sequences. Rather than both players doing this, which could take a while, just one will separate out their trumps, Honours, courts, and aces. These cards are then laid out these in columns, first a column for trumps, and then columns for each of the suits. By leaving gaps where there are missing cards players can see any cricche and sequences immediately and infer from the gaps, those that will be scored by the opponent.